Osamu Aoki wrote:
> Hi,
>
> On Sat, Sep 17, 2005 at 02:41:43PM +0100, Antony Gelberg wrote:
>>Before I get too involved however, can somebody give me a guide as to
>>how the Reference is looked upon from within Debian?
>
>
> In my honest opinion, most of the DD are busy with thier own packages,
> few took time to read DR in details, or at all, to find minor issues
> which was caused by the migration of packages with time. Besides, they
> have good post-installation skill, they do not need to learn from this.
I hear that. But it feels like, support-wise, we are reaching a
critical mass. I like spending time on #debian but would like it more
if there weren't thirty people a day wondering why they have broken
packages in unstable, or why their X server doesn't work, or why stable
doesn't contain KDE 3.4.
> If you want to get interest level on Documentation itself, you may want
> to read debian-doc archive.
I did, then I decided that I'd had my fill of spam for the day. *grin*
>>It seems to me that it is the closest thing that we have to a distro
>>manual, and contains lots of useful pointers, but suffers from lack of
>>visibility and lack of structure.
>
>
> Your observation is somewhat correct. I think user oriented
> distribution manual is collection of documents now. See list on
> http://www.debian.org/doc .
I am well aware of that URL, and it's not ideal. Lots of things spread
about and out of date. And a Progeny manual to boot. The best *cough*
thing I found was the Debian Dictionary. That needs removal.
> I have few suggestions and comment.
>
> * please check out archive of debian-doc mailing list.
> * please think ways to improve this situation as a volunteer project.
> (i.e., few has time to work on issues you think is the most important
> and they have their own priorities. You can dictate only your time
> and efforts.)
I raised 325655 a couple of weeks ago, but that is more related to
getting new users directed _to_ the docs, rather than the actual content
within. It's amazing how many don't even know that the reference
exists. As you allude to above, you and I both know it's there, and
we're the ones who need it least. There are _too many_ options and not
enough clarity in www.debian.org/doc. I will focus on the Reference for
now but hope that the web team will look at this when they can.
> * Please bring live duck to us. It is easy to complain but providing
> something positive with minimal efforts of the others requires a
> lot of time and efforts of yours. Here are my wishlist:
> - Be kind to the people who contributed their time to the project.
> - Report bug with a patch to SGML source.
> - Think translation syncing (I need patch for all languages to update)
> - Keeping CVS and web up in shape.
> - Help ensure functioning TeTeX international build environment
> in pbuilder
> - Help SGML(traditiional encodings) to XML(UTF-8) transition efforts.
> ...
There's rather a lot there. I'll start with a patch for Chapter 2 to
see if we are on the same wavelength. We need to restructure it before
we can improve the content.
Antony